It is never a quiet week in the realm of social media platforms as the tectonic plates keep shifting with new features, products, tests, and other news coming in every day. Here is our weekly roundup of social media news and activity from the industry.

Social Samosa is your gateway to keeping up with the hottest social media news and updates, proceedings and trends from the digital marketing industry, brand campaigns and more. This week’s social media news was dominated by the introduction of new features, filters and updates on Facebook, Instagram, Whatsapp, YouTube, and Snapchat.

Check out all the other important social media news and updates that surfaced online this week.

How to check time spent on Facebook & Instagram

Facebook and Instagram have come up with a new tool on their app which will tell the users exactly how much time they’re spending on them on a daily basis. The social media platform says they want to ensure that the users spend their ‘time well’. Read more about it here.

All you need to know about Whatsapp Business API

WhatsApp to finally monetize as today it announced the launch of the Whatsapp Business API which will charge businesses for sending customer service and marketing related messages. The new Business API app will let businesses respond to messages from users for free for up to 24 hours. Read more about it here.

Snapchat quietly launched sticker packs to win over creators

Snapchat’s charm offense with creators continues with the trial of creator-made stickers. This comes on the heels of the launch of Storytellers, a program launched last week that connects brands with top creators to make ad campaigns on Snapchat. Read more about it here.

YouTube plans original programming in India, Japan and other markets

Alphabet Inc’s YouTube is creating scripted series and other original programming for international markets including France, Germany, Japan, Mexico and India to try to draw new customers to its paid subscription service, a senior executive said on Friday. Read more about it here.

Snapchat deals with NFL, NBC add more sports videos

The jury’s still out on whether or not Snapchat Stories are successful, but giants in the sports realm are apparently happy. Snap has signed deals with the NFL and NBC that will bring more sports programming to your phone. Read more about it here.

Snapchat introduces new speech recognition filters

After rolling out branded AR filters, Snapchat has now launched news lens filters that will respond to a snapchatter’s voice. Enter – Snapchat speech recognition filter. These are the very first lenses by the photo sharing app that recognize speech and respond accordingly. Snapchat currently boasts of 191 million daily active users. Read more about it here.